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Tips, Tricks, and Tactics
This part is a work in progress. I hope other players will add their own knowledge here. Archaeology Missions: Well by now you should have the basic understanding that certain planets will yield more artifacts then others. Such as planets you own yeilding the least, and planets owned by other players or NPC's the most. Each mission will yield X amount of artifacts. So I have found that launching each Salvage ship as a single mission, will yield the greatest number of artifacts. This also has a side bonus of loading your ships at a more even pace so you dont end up with a ship or two completely loaded while you have another 2 or so ships still empty. To further the cause I like to leave an unoccupied planet in my system so missions don't take as much time. Then using like 4 Salvage ships I send them each one at a time to collect. This allows me to make about 8 to 12 missions before they are maxed out with full cargo. (about 3 waves of missions) and about 30-34 artifacts to unload in least amount of time. Other bonus is you accumulate a larger mission count and further you advancement in Prestige which is another point system that will help your Federation to advance in rank. Artifacts: I reccomend waiting untill your Xeno Tech is at the full potential of 4,000 points before you begin trying to run analysis on them. Even with 4,000 tech don't be surprised if you succeed in discovering only about 3 in 10. With full tech I seem to have the largest number of them self destruct, and a similar number or slightly smaller number of them explode and cause destruction to my Xeno Labs. A good number will also just get returned with no results. Not to depress you here but please note that some may even explode durring installation and dammage the ship or PDB. In any case they are well worth the effort when you have your base up and running as they can add a good boost to your statistics. Colonization: This recipe calls for a player just starting the game with potential for earning chits / bonus by doing the Tutorial. Add 2 colony ships and hopefully a short distance to next unoccupied planet. There are many ways to colonize planets. Everyone develops their own system, but if you are just starting off you may wish to get a second base up just so you can shuffle between the two colonies to have something to do. What I like to do is get my first base rolling with infrastructures, but even before they are maxed out I will get a colony ship building. Your first base will start with decent levels but your next one will be starting from scratch. In order to keep your population from dying off at a rate per hour you need 40 social, and 40 enviroment. Each colony ship adds 5 to your social structure as well as a population boost and spendable resource boost. However in the begining of the game you can go through the tutorial which is a simple matter of clicking to next lesson and building a few items, or sending a few ship missions. For which you will be provided free ships. DO THIS and get the free chits and the free double production Bonus. NOTE: if you do this in Andromeda you will want to produce just one factory and one astrogation tech as doing more may slow you down and you will have to wait anywhere from 1/2 an hour to a few hours before you can proceed to next lesson. So it's day one hopefully you just did the tutorials, and started in a system with another planet or so to choose from. If not you may need to increase Astrogation to a level to reach the next star system. Now with your first colony ship built you can either wait a bit, or start working on a second one as soon as possible as this method will still need the added population boost. Pick your next planet (hopefully it will compliment your first one in resources by having more of what you will need). Send the colony ship to colonize and when it gets there start with building Social and put just one or two on a resource structure. When the resource structure runs it time and your slot opens up (hopefully you built enough Social that your resources are very low) Go to Trade on top of screen and use those chits to buy needed Resources and put the next resource structure up a few points. Use the left over to further increase Social. Repeat this process so that you get 40 to 45 Social and 5 to 10 points in each Resource structure. When Social is at 40 - 45 then move to Environment and do the same. You will exaust your population so having the next colony ship ready to drop will determine how things turn out. If you did this in the same solar system you can exchange small ammounts of resources back and forth and further speed this process. This is the fastest way to get an extra planet up and running but relies on you having chits. So do the tutorial and log in the next day to get daily bonus. You can potentially have your second planet running and working on its tech with in the first couple days. (I recommend starting with Administration as it will increase your resource output). NOTE: this process is further slowed if you are playing Andromeda, you may bog down if you over do the Tutorial, on the positive side population dies off slower. Getting a second planet is a major first step in ensuring the success of your empire. Even if the best planet is off in another system I suggest staying close by to further speed your process as eventually you will get Propulsion tech better developed. Hunting NPC's : To start off I am going to describe the NPC's as types. This is a subject I am still exploring and will fill in as time passes. There are 3 main types of NPC's (Non Player Characters, or computer run accounts). These are the best targets as they seem to follow certain patterns in their responses to aggression, or in their own aggression. Besides they just don't hold grudges very long. The 3 main types could get broken down into sub sections but here is the basic idea- -'' Squatters ''- These guys will show up when a sector begins to fill up or reaches a certain base occupancy level. They will spawn a base(s) in this sector with prebuilt PDB's and a fleet that will sit in solar defense position. They may even move in right next door. However they are passive and will not attack you unless you provoke them. Personally I feel they must have a tollerance threshold, as I have experienced various levels of tollerance from the various Squatter types. (This is why I would say there are sub sections to this area) - ''Pirates - ''Pirates begin to spawn (or rather become a possibility of spawning) when your sector is reached the occupancy level that allows the Squatter types to spawn. They will become a possibility or get a percent chance to occur exactly one month from the first occurance Squatter types in your sector. You will recieve a dispatch informing you that Pirate fleets have been spotted and will have ONE week to hunt down and destroy these fleets in your sector. If any fleets survive they will colonize an unoccupied planet and send fleets out to Raid your bases. - ''Crime Syndicates - ''As with pirates they also will not spawn or rather have a chance of spawning untill one month from the introduction of the first squatters. There will be no warning and they will send Black Op ships to any base(s) in range. They seem to send a varried type of operations, generally I have sen this as one terrorist mission and one sedition mission type. The first attack they make on your planet will also send a message that allows you to pay them 10% of that bases income for one week of ceased aggression. It is generally recommended you take this offer to buy you time to locate their base. These guys are particularly destructive to new founded bases. They will locate you very fast and will hit for serious dammage to a fledgling planet. The best defense against them is in utillizing the "Picket Fleet" tactic and having a maxed security tech...